PHOCA is valid in Collins, not in North America — 12 points
It depends on the list you play by. PHOCA is in Collins, used in the UK and most of the world, but it is not in the North American lists — so in a US or Canadian game an opponent can challenge it off the board. Worth 12 points. Words with Friends does not accept it either.
Which word lists accept PHOCA?
| Official Scrabble Players DictionaryUSA, Canada, Thailand | Not listed |
|---|---|
| Official Tournament and Club Word ListUSA, Canada, Thailand | Not listed |
| Collins Scrabble WordsEnglish in most countries | Valid |
| Words with FriendsZynga word list | Not listed |
Word power: 39 / 100
Our own measure of how useful PHOCA is to know. It scores 12 from 5 tiles, takes 2 hooks, and its letters make up 4.6% of the bag. How this number is calculated
Hooks for PHOCA
Checked against OSPD, TWL, CSW, WWF. Takes an S, so it hooks onto plurals easily.
How PHOCA scores
Face value of the 5 tiles in PHOCA, before any board multiplier.
Tiles you need
| Letter | Needed | In the bag |
|---|---|---|
| p | 1 | 2 |
| h | 1 | 2 |
| o | 1 | 8 |
| c | 1 | 2 |
| a | 1 | 9 |
Drawing exactly these 5 tiles as an opening rack: 1 in 130,708.
What does PHOCA mean in Scrabble?
noun
rarezoology
A seal, especially one of the earless or true seals.
Phoca comes from the Greek and Latin word for seal and turns up in older or more technical English as a plain word for the animal, distinct from its use as a scientific genus name for particular seal species. Outside zoology the word is rarely used.
How PHOCA is used
Rare outside zoological and older literary writing.
- The naturalist sketched a phoca resting on the ice.
- Old bestiaries described the phoca in fanciful terms.
- A phoca hauled itself onto the rocks to sun there.
- The poem compares the swimmer to a phoca in the surf.
- Zoology texts once used phoca as a general word for seal.
Written for this site: 1 meaning of PHOCA and 5 example sentences, not copied from a published dictionary.
Anagrams of PHOCA
The 5 tiles of PHOCA in a different order — 1 found.
Words starting with PHOCA
2 longer words begin with PHOCA.
Shorter words from the letters in PHOCA
Common questions about PHOCA
- Is PHOCA valid in Words with Friends?
- No. Words with Friends keeps its own list, separate from the Scrabble dictionaries, and PHOCA is not in it.
- How many points is PHOCA worth?
- PHOCA is worth 12 points in Scrabble and 13 points in Words with Friends.
- What does PHOCA mean?
- A seal, especially one of the earless or true seals.
- What letters can be added to PHOCA?
- PHOCA takes 2 hooks: 0 in front and 2 at the end.
Every word you can build from the 5 letters of PHOCA:
Open PHOCA in the Word Finder